I have not followed the White House whining about Fox News very closely but I took notice of this:
White House officials once again advanced its contention that Fox News and its commentators are not journalists, rather a propaganda wing of the Republican Party. During the gaggle, an informal on-the-record but off-camera briefing between the White House press secretary and some members of the media, Robert Gibbs and ABC’s Jake Tapper had this conversation:
Tapper: It’s escaped none of our notice that the White House has decided in the last few weeks to declare one of our sister organizations “not a news organization” and to tell the rest of us not to treat them like a news organization. Can you explain why it’s appropriate for the White House to decide that a news organization is not one –
(Crosstalk)
Gibbs: Jake, we render, we render an opinion based on some of their coverage and the fairness that, the fairness of that coverage.
Tapper: But that’s a pretty sweeping declaration that they are “not a news organization.” How are they any different from, say –
Gibbs: ABC –
Tapper: ABC. MSNBC. Univision. I mean how are they any different?
Gibbs: You and I should watch sometime around 9 o’clock tonight. Or 5 o’clock this afternoon.
Tapper: I’m not talking about their opinion programming or issues you have with certain reports. I’m talking about saying thousands of individuals who work for a media organization, do not work for a “news organization” — why is that appropriate for the White House to say?
Gibbs: That’s our opinion.
Read the whole report. The White House and the left-leaning press is unhappy. Moveon.org wants Dems to stay off Fox, a kind of boycott.
I have trouble getting worked up over this given the savaging that Sarah Palin took during the campaign, especially from MSNBC. As noted in this blog report, an unnamed White House contact said the purpose of the FOX war is to get journalists to think twice about what to cover.
“We’re doing what we think is important to make sure news is covered as fairly as possible,” a White House official told POLITICO, noting how the recent ACORN scandal story started because Fox covered it “breathlessly for weeks on end.”
Yeah, that’s going to work. When an administration actively attempts to control the press coverage in this manner, they expose their real objective. FOX News will probably work a little harder to find the stories which the other networks ignore. And perhaps, one hopes, the real journalists in the other organizations will wake up.
Additional thoughts: I should have paired this story with the one about the unnamed White House advisor telling the liberal left to take off their pajamas and get dressed. Message to right or left who question the big boys: How’s your cat?
UPDATE: David Axelrod tells the New York Times Thursday:
“This is a discussion that probably had to be had about their approach to things,” Mr. Axelrod said. “Our concern is other media not follow their lead.”
@ Brady,
I think the qualifier here is “when applied to Christians…”
Fox is not Christian…tends to be Conservative.
Debbie- you’re right, you don’t know my ideology, and it’s neither secular nor liberal. Simply because I pointed out a disagreement doesn’t make me either.
I can tell you my ideology doesn’t take well to conversations where terms like “childish drivel” and statements like, “people with half a brain cell” are tossed around, but if yours does, more power.
And the jump David made so quickly from Fox to Christians is hardly a stretch, but I’ll leave it there.
Brady, I said:
I did not say all the attacks were fair, did I?
David made two separate points. ‘Twas you who tried to make it sound as if he’d linked the Fox News attacks with Christian-bashing. I agreed with David, not you. We have not said Obama is attacking Christians. Plenty of people in secular la la land are attacking us, however.
Your attempt at logic isn’t working, Brady. You also may want to take note of the fact that some of us here have made strong statements denouncing some of our fellow Christians in Uganda who deserve to be denounced. Got any secular liberals you want to denounce? Actually, I don’t know your ideology.
This is childish drivel when there is much more important work to be done.
Debbie- I would call the “smear” attacks that went on against Palin on par with what I saw against Obama, Bush, Kerry, etc. Give me one that you see as outright anti-Christian or anti-woman, and I’ll pair it right up with one on Obama.
Unfortunatey that’s what happens when you are in the public eye. But, to say that the attcks on her were anti-woman or anti-Christian and then to say the attacks against Obama were just fair attacks isn’t an unbiased analysis of the situation.
I never said Fox news was a Christian organization–David is the one that took the Obama administration’s calling Fox news a fake news organization and expanded it to ad-hom attacks on Christians and then called it religious suppression. Then you agreed with him. I’m wondering how you guys made that kind of a jump. The implication from the statement that there is some anti-Christian attacks going on here from the Obama administration. I’m trying to figure how you guys are making that connection.
“People with a brain can tell the difference.” Speaking of ad hominem attacks–would that be one? Maybe just an implied one, I guess.
Brady, would you call the smear attacks on Palin merely “unfavorable” reports? There is a definite distinction between the two. Palin suffered both, deservedly and undeservedly, IMO. People with a brain can tell the difference.
Since when did Fox News become a Christian organ? Hannity and O’Reilly are Catholic and Beck is Mormon, as far as I know. THey are the big three at Fox liberals loves to hate. The media is far more worked up over anything evangelical — Palin has evangelical, even Pentecostal ties — than they are about mainstream religion or however we want to classify Mormonism.
Obama is getting his fair share of bashing, some deserved, some not, just like all sitting presidents.
David- sorry, you’re right!
Debbie- are you saying any time someone speaks unfavorably about a woman, a Christian, or a conservative they are anti- those things?
So, if the President talks bad about Fox News it’s anti-Christian (I’m still unsure how or why), and if the media talks bad about Palin, they are anti-Christian and anti-woman, but if Fox News talks bad about Obama then they are just reporting the facts?
Sounds kind of like the victimhood strategy most conservatives I listen to seem to despise.
Debbie: I think Palin took the most hits for coming across an airhead. My oposition to her had nothing to do with her being a woman, a Christian or a conservative. I would have voted for McCain if he had chosen someone more qualified. There must be other conservative, Christian women better suited to being President.
Self-defense, and also defense of her family. With Palin, the media got a three-fer: anti-woman, anti-Christian and anti-conservative. Hillary Clinton also took hits for being a woman, I believe.
@ Brady,
I think you meant me :).
Michael- I’ll give you attempted suppression of free speech, but secular attempts to suppress religious point of view is a bit of a stretch.
What was it when Sarah Palin was railing against the “liberal media?” Just regular attempt to suppress free speech, or also religious suppresion?
Yep. It’s becoming a well-known fact, along with the liberal charge that Christians are seeking to be “Dominionists,” who want to establish a theocracy in America. What Uganda is seeking to do, with the push from Christians there, will, sadly, add more fuel to that fire.
These sort of “frontal assaults” on basic freedoms guaranteed by the constitution is what has many conservatives and Christians nervous.
These are largely ad hominem attacks which are made.
When applied to Christians, they are easily identified as a form of prejudice and bigotry…
That’s OK, better Christians than we have endured much worse. Let’s toughen up and call it what it is…
suppression of free speech, religious bigotry, secular attempts to suppress religious points of view.
The more the White House talks about this, the more terrible it gets. When I heard the first mention of it, I kind of chalked it up with Sarah Palin (and to a much lesser extent Pres. Bush) making it a point to refer to the media as the “liberal media.” It made sense that if the Repubs in power were going to call the media liberal, the Dems in power would turn around and do the same.
But to now say things like they are attempting to make sure news is fairly covered, and to refuse to grant interviews to Fox, is a bit much for me.
I’m with Mary, though, the media is biased. I tend to chalk it up to an attempt at ratings more than political hostility (in most cases), but regardless, it’s not the government’s job to try to sort it out.
LOL!!!! FOX is now reporting what is on CNN. Showing pics, newsclips, and reporters on CNN and reporting the quotes as heard and seen on CNN.
Honestly, this is funny to me. The media is much more biased and filled with propaganda on both sides – more so than I think – at any other time – except for during WWII.